Preparation of radiochemically pure (79)Se and highly precise determination of its half-life

Gerhard Jörg; Rolf Bühnemann; Simon Hollas; Niko Kivel; Karsten Kossert; Stefaan Van Winckel; Christoph Lierse V Gostomski

doi:10.1016/j.apradiso.2010.05.006

Preparation of radiochemically pure (79)Se and highly precise determination of its half-life

Appl Radiat Isot. 2010 Dec;68(12):2339-51. doi: 10.1016/j.apradiso.2010.05.006. Epub 2010 May 20.

Authors

Gerhard Jörg¹, Rolf Bühnemann, Simon Hollas, Niko Kivel, Karsten Kossert, Stefaan Van Winckel, Christoph Lierse V Gostomski

Affiliation

¹ Lehrstuhl für Radiochemie (RCM), Technische Universität München, Walther-Meissner-Str. 3, 85748 Garching, Germany. gerhard.joerg@radiochemie.de

PMID: 20627600
DOI: 10.1016/j.apradiso.2010.05.006

Abstract

Reliable knowledge of the (79)Se half-life is crucial, e.g. for the safety assessments of final repositories for nuclear waste. However, a literature survey reveals an inconsistent picture, indicating remarkably difficult experimental conditions. This work reports a new value of 3.27(8) × 10(5) a for the half-life of (79)Se. The uncertainty is less than half of the latest published result. The sample was prepared radiochemically pure from a reprocessing solution by exploitation of reductive deposition on Cu, anion exchange chromatography and sublimation. The specific activity was determined by inductively coupled plasma optical emission spectrometry (ICP-OES) and liquid scintillation counting (LSC). Hydride generation multicollector inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry (HG-MC-ICP-MS) was applied for the establishment of the isotopic composition.